


for years or for hours

by narryblossom



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Afterlife, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Arranged Marriage, Corpse Bride AU, Endgame Niall Horan/Harry Styles, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-22
Updated: 2016-10-22
Packaged: 2018-08-24 02:01:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8351887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/narryblossom/pseuds/narryblossom
Summary: “Do you really think people marry for love these days?” his father scoffed. Harry merely shrugged his shoulders, casting his gaze out the carriage window to a puddle that spanned the width of the street, reflective surface shattering as the wheels spun through it. “We can’t afford that! Besides, that’s a ridiculous notion. Where would you get such a nonsensical idea?”“Nowhere, Father,” Harry sighed. He longed to be anywhere else but on his way to his wedding rehearsal, but short of throwing himself from the moving carriage and hoping he either died or was well enough to run away after landing, he had no choice but to stay.(In other words, a Corpse Bride AU in which Harry wants to marry for love, and does, after The End.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Corpse Bride AU. The beginning is strongly influenced by the movie, but my assigned characters do not necessarily line up with the plot of the movie.

The outskirts of London were rich in people, but not in gold. As winter settled in and it became too cold to work and too cold to beg for change, families settled on merging to save expenses and resources in order to survive the season. It had almost become a tradition in this part of town, seeing which families would crack under the cold pressure and marry off one of their children in exchange for a shared wealth. The town was lucky, though, that winter was mild this year, freezing the canal but leaving only a few centimeters of snow through the town rather than a few feet as it had in years previous. Less families were merging because of this, but Harry’s wasn’t so lucky.

Harry didn’t much care about the state of the weather regardless of what it was; he preferred to stay in when at all possible. He used to have times of extroversion that would draw him from his home and into a pub or a theater in his most extravagant evening wear. During these excursions, he would often find himself charming his way into free spirits from the barmaids, and because of this, had earned himself a reputation. He was a charmer, certainly, and a good one at that. He had kissed more maidens than he knew the names of, and both of those numbers were quite high.

He was a gentleman just as much as he was a charmer, and that reputation was not ignored. He treated women sweetly and courted them unofficially as often as they’d let him. He knew they chatted about him, about who would be the lucky maiden to get him to settle down. He thought he would get a say in the matter, but having been in the dark about his parents’ financial struggle, he had no idea that a merger was being arranged in his name until a tall, frail girl with berry stained lips introduced herself with a whirlwind of excitement and talk of their future.

And so Harry stared out the window of his family carriage longingly as his parents clambered in. He disliked this change of scenery, finding the outside of his home much less appealing than the inside. It was as cold as every other house on the street, but at least he had a warm spot beside the fireplace in his room with his journals and his books.

“Are you paying attention?” his mother huffed suddenly, smacking his knee with her folded paper fan. Harry jumped, turning his gaze back and forth between his frowning parents.

“Yes,” he sighed. “I am. You’re telling me again how you’re forcing me to marry to keep you from the poor house.”

He hadn’t been paying attention really, but ever since one of his father’s business partners had approached him with the marriage arrangement that condemned him, Harry had been hearing the same speech again and again.

“Don’t look at it that way,” his mother let out an identical sigh to his own. “Look at it as giving us a better life. You  _ know _ we deserve a better life.”

“But why not Gemma?” He’d asked, “She’s your precious  _ first _ child. Why do _ I _ have to get married?”

“Because you pass on the  _ name _ .” His father’s voice raised slightly in frustration. He was tired of the questions Harry kept asking, annoyed by the progressive ideas in Harry’s head about love and lust rather than necessity. “You carry Styles. She doesn’t.”

“She’s still a Styles even if she takes someone else’s last name. She’s still part of the family…”

“You know that it’s not the same, Harry.  _ You know that _ ,” his mother scowled, rubbing her temple.  Her disappointment was evident in the way her eyes wouldn’t meet his though he was the only thing in front of her to look at. She looked above his head instead where his hair sat in neat ringlets rather than the disheveled mess parted to the side that he thought looked better.

Harry was silent the rest of the ride, knowing it was useless to try to argue. They explained it to him a million times already. If Harry married into a rich family, what belonged to his wife belonged to him. If Gemma married into a rich family, what belonged to her belonged to her husband, and it’s  _ not _ the same. Harry knew that.

“What if I don’t like her?” he blurted, chewing on his lip after as he gazed down at his lap to avoid the glares from his parents.

“It doesn’t matter if you don’t like her, Harry. You’re marrying her.”

“Do you really think people marry for  _ love _ these days?” his father scoffed. Harry merely shrugged his shoulders, casting his gaze out the carriage window to a puddle that spanned the width of the street, reflective surface shattering as the wheels spun through it. “We can’t afford that! Besides, that’s a ridiculous notion. Where would you get such a nonsensical idea?”

“Nowhere, Father,” Harry sighed. He longed to be anywhere else but on his way to his wedding rehearsal, but short of throwing himself from the moving carriage and hoping he either died or was well enough to run away after landing, he had no choice but to stay.

“It’s in all those books you’ve been reading,” he grumbled. “A man needs to be educated, not fantasizing.”

“I’m not fantasizing about anything, Father. You mustn’t worry about me.”

“Oh, but I do,” he sighed. “I do.”

Harry remained silent for the rest of the short ride across the village, choosing instead to listen to his parents bicker about the shade of maroon on his mother’s dress versus the shade of it on his father’s cravat.

The Jenner estate was larger than his own and filled with young, able servants in stunning contrast with the elderly servants that had been been taking care of Harry’s estate for generations. The foyer was the size of several rooms in his home combined, but it was dark and unwelcoming, much like the eyes of the man and woman that met Harry and his parents at the door.

“Ahh, hello again Mr. Styles,” the man greeted coldly.

“Hello again, sir. Thank you for inviting us to your home. This is my wife…,” he motioned towards his wife before clearing his throat as Sir Jenner narrowed his eyes, “and our son, Harry.”

“I assumed,” he mumbled under his breath as he cast a glare in Harry’s direction, eyeing him up and down quickly. “You’re not quite what we expected.”

As Harry opened his mouth to make a comment, his mother brought her heel down on his toes. He jumped in the slightest, forcing a tight-lipped smile onto his face to hide the groan growing in his chest.

“Thank you,” Harry forced out instead.

“Mm,” the man’s wife scowled, turning away from the family at the door. “We’ll be taking tea in the west drawing room before the rehearsal.” She held her head high with a self-absorbed aura of sophistication, assuming that as she walked away, her company would follow--and of course, they did.

“This is a lovely home,” Harry’s mother commented as they crossed the foyer, putting on her most genuine act as she passed the empty compliment. The mother of Harry’s bride-to-be ignored her.

“Psst.”

Harry heard a whisper near the entrance to the hall his family was being led down. His curiosity stopped him, pulling him away from his parents as they continued to walk. He looked around slowly to find the cause of the noise while also making sure no one noticed his absence.

“Psssst, over here,” he heard again. He turned his head to find the voice, skimming his surroundings quickly before finding what he was looking for-- _ who _ , more like. He could see a portion of Kendall’s face peeking from a dimly lit room. A smile spread across her tinted lips as he noticed her. She beckoned him closer with one dainty finger before backing into the room and waiting, assuming he would follow just as her mother had done.

Harry spared a glance towards the room he was meant to be going in, but the door closed without anyone noticing his absence--maybe it was fate, or maybe it was that the butler didn’t see him waiting in the hall. Regardless, this event left him with nothing to do but cautiously approach the door that his bride waited behind. As she saw him approach, she stuck her arm out and drew him in closer, quickly closing the door behind him.

“Hi,” she purred, laying her hands delicately on his chest to push him back against the closed door. Her gentle touch just above his lungs stole the air from them, or at least that’s what it seemed like as Harry drew in a ragged breath, eyes shifting away from her excitement. He noticed then that they were in a closed dining room at the foot of a table that could hold upwards of twenty guests though he had heard her family was comprised of less than ten. A servant’s room, he concluded, noticing the dull cutlery and absence of decoration. A drab place for a bride to choose to hide, or perhaps a clever place that no one would think to check.

“Hello,” he choked out, voice low and timid. Perhaps it wasn’t her touch that took his breath away; no, it wasn’t only the touch, but the entire promiscuous act had stolen the air from him. The thought of a woman--an  _ unwed woman _ \--coming onto him in such a manner, sneaking him off to a servants’ hall with who knows  _ what _ intention was simply unheard of. The mere thought of being caught in such a compromising position is what took his breath away--surely it was that and not his pure, overwhelming disdain towards her and their entire arrangement.

“It’s been too long since I’ve seen you,” she smiled at up him, sliding her hands down his chest to rest just above where the butterflies were rumbling in his stomach. His smile turned out more like a grimace than he intended to let on, and it faltered from the moment it appeared on his face.

“We’re to be married tomorrow,” she said then when he didn’t respond. The way she smiled at him was contradictory, both as if she knew and didn’t know that the next day was the exact thing he’d been dreading since he had heard the news. Her voice was sing-songy either way, and far too much so for how he felt. It seemed to lash him, making him flinch, and reaffirm that he was being buried deep into a previously excavated grave.

“We are,” he nodded, tugging at the collar of his shirt. He looked up towards the ceiling then, thinking that anything would be better to look at than the deep wells of brown in her eyes. She was bad at reading body language, it seemed, or perhaps she was fantastic at it but chose to pull the silk cravat from Harry’s vest anyway, twisting it in her hand like a leash to pull him in closer.

“Isn’t it great? Then we get to start a family,” she whispered, breath tickling the quiver of his bottom lip.

“A...a family.” He hesitated when he talked and he tried to hide his tone, but the frown that settled across her face let him know that his voice was just as unsure as he felt.

“Yes,” she insisted, “we’re bound to have a family.”

“Right,” he nodded. “After we’re...married.”

“Yes, married.” She stared at him, boring holes into his skull as he struggled to maintain eye contact. Her head started to lean in, but Harry tried to slyly tilt his away--he was almost thankful when the door behind them opened, nearly sending them both tumbling to the floor. Kendall’s mother gasped as she recognized the pair, and her disbelief grew to anger as she saw their close proximity.

“You shouldn’t be alone together!” She berated, grabbing her daughter’s arm tightly, simultaneously pulling Kendall away while inserting herself between the soon-to-be couple.

“I’m sor-,” Harry tried, but his father’s voice cut him off from the doorway of the drawing room.

“It’s minutes before the rehearsal!”

“Yes, father, I-”

“So go!” he shouted, pointing towards the drawing room. “Don’t just stand there!”

Harry stared dumbfoundedly at his father before turning his head to the ground and quickly filing into the room. When he raised his head, he noticed that it was decorated to appear like a church with rows of seats on either side of the room as mock pews, and at the front of the room stood a tall priest with a permanent glare behind a long table draped with an even longer white cloth. 

Harry swallowed the lump in his throat and turned to look at his parents as they sat on one side of the bare aisle through the middle of the room. His father tapped the middle of his chest while clearing his throat, but Harry didn’t understand what he meant.

“ _ Fix _ your  _ cravat _ ,” he hissed, rolling his eyes when Harry’s face lit up in realization. Harry tucked the silk piece back into his vest and buttoned the bottom of his jacket before turning back to the priest. From where he stood, he noticed the light from the large window behind the priest cast his shadow over the pair of taper candles that were waiting to be lit by the hands of Harry and his bride-to-be. Two glasses of wine sat beside the candles, and in front of those, two rings.

“Go on,” Kendall whispered, suddenly at his side again. She held her hand up as an invitation for him to hold. He knew he was supposed to, so he took her hand, but his feet stayed planted where they were. She smiled the tiniest bit and led Harry in slowly taking a step forward, reluctant as he did. They moved slowly until they were stood directly in the glare of the priest.

“I assume you’ve both practiced your vows?” he asked, glancing back and forth between the two as Harry dropped Kendall’s hand.

“Yes,” Kendall answered softly, and at the same time, Harry mumbled a soft,

“Umm…”

“Have you not learned your vows?” the priest accused, narrowing his eyes with a burning glare in Harry’s direction.

“Well, I hav-”

“I will say them once for you, and then you will say them,” he interrupted in an annoyed tone. “Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Harry sighed, twisting his hands around his cravat nervously, stopping only when he heard his mother clear her throat--a silent chide at him to stop his nervous habit. He smoothed the silk again and waited as the priest relayed Harry’s vows.

“With this hand, I will lift your sorrows. Your cup will never empty for I will be your wine. With this candle, I will light your way in darkness. With this ring, I ask you to be mine.”

Harry nodded at the priest in a silent thanks after he finished, but the priest only returned the smack of his fist on the table.

“ _ Your _ turn.”

“Oh! Yes, I’m-” he silenced his apology before it could escape, instead taking a slow, deep breath before beginning. “With...with this hand,” Harry started slowly, lifting his left hand into the air as the priest had done.

“Your  _ right _ hand,” he hissed.

“My… right!” He jumped as the realization hit him, face flushing a bright red. He lifted his right hand in place of his left, then looked blankly at the angry priest.

“Go on,” he demanded. Harry stuttered as he struggled to remember the next line.

“ _ This _ is who we’re marrying our daughter to?” he heard Kendall’s mother ask.

“I thought he would  _ at least _ be intelligent to make up for his... _ femininity _ ,” the father sneered. Harry’s throat felt dry as he tried to speak up and continue the vows, but he couldn’t find his voice.

“This boy does not know his vows! Do you not wish to be married?!”

“No!” Harry insisted, lowering his hand.

“You don’t?” Kendall asked, looking up at him with a pout, but also a hint of betrayal in her eyes. He could hear his father yelling from behind him, something about how  _ dare _ he disgrace the family like this, but the rush in his ears drowned out the noise. He turned slowly as he stumbled away from the table to see Kendall’s father walking towards him, arms extended and hands near another as if he were going to reach up and strangle him. Harry dodged this encounter and ran towards the door, ignoring the shouts behind him. He didn’t stop running until he had left their estate, passed the town gates, and was crossing a bridge that led him over the canal and into the forest.

Harry knew this forest well, and also knew that not many other people did. He would be safe in the forest-- _ alone _ , as he wanted to be. The only problem with the forest at this time is that, well, it was  _ winter _ and Harry was only in a suit jacket. And it was  _ dark _ because the sun had already set across the December sky. Oh, and the fact that Harry had never been on this side of town, and therefore had never crossed this side of the canal into this side of the forest.

Even though he had little idea where he was, Harry trampled over the underbrush as he struggled his way under the umbrella of the trees. He took off his wrinkled cravat and tied it onto a branch in case he lost his way, casting one last glance over his shoulder to the dimming lights of the city before trying to make his way through the darkness using only the moonlight to guide him.

Harry wandered around, searching for any sort of footpath to guide him in some direction. He grew frustrated when the weeds and thorny bushes only grew thicker, seeming to surround him like arms, pulling at his clothes and stabbing at his skin.

As Harry started to lose hope of finding his way, the bushes and brambles began to thin out like he was nearing a well-used area. He felt triumphant as he brushed himself off lightly, but that feeling quickly changed as he took one step further into the darkness, and the ground came out from beneath him, sending him tumbling down a small cliff-face to a lower area of the forest.

Harry was lucky that he landed in a pile of soft, dead leaves rather than the jagged rocks to one side, or hard roots of a nearby tree, or the chopped stump a few more feet in front of him.

When the aching in his back and his neck began to subside, Harry slowly sat up from the leaves and pulled himself onto the smooth stump. He inspected his hands and felt his face for cuts or pieces of rocks stuck into his skin, but found none. For the fall he had, he was mostly unscathed. He then looked around, trying to pick out any distinguishing feature as to where he was, and then he saw it--the frozen canal, almost disguised by the snowfall, going right through the middle of the cleared area. He sighed with relief when he realized that he could simply follow the canal when he was ready to go home, and then he felt more relaxed.

He couldn’t relax for long, though, because his anxieties surrounding his wedding crept back into his mind as soon as he felt calm.

“I know the vows,” he sighed, mumbling to himself, “they’re not hard. She doesn’t  _ deserve _ them.” Maybe his father had been right, he thought, maybe he was reading too many books. The idea of marrying for love filled his mind and took over him, which he now pinned as the reason that he was so against marrying Kendall. He didn’t  _ love  _ her, he couldn’t. There was something vicious about her, something about her whole  _ family  _ that made him uncomfortable. He didn’t want to be a part of anything they were plotting, and he didn’t want his family to be part of it either.

In a mocking tone, Harry began his vows, acting out the movements passionately. “With this hand, I will lift your sorrows,” he said, standing on his feet with his arm held above him.

“Your cup will never empty for I will be your wine.” His hand curled as though he were holding a wine glass in his palm.

“With this candle, I will light your way in darkness.” Harry looked around for a stick as he spoke, then used it as though it were a candle and tapped the end of it to another stick as though he were lighting his “candle.”

“With this ring, I ask you to be mine.” As he ended, he slipped a decorative ring off his finger--a thick, silver band with a large Amethyst set into it--and slid it onto a low reaching branch that stuck up from the root of the tree at an odd angle and then dangled off almost like a hand.

Harry chuckled softly and pulled at his hair, untangling small twigs as leaves, thankful that no one was around to accuse him of being crazy. Then he frowned, realizing no matter what he does or what he says, he’ll have to go back and the wedding would happen according to plan. 

Harry reached for the ring as he grimaced at the thought of his future life with Kendall. He imagined this strange tree branch with his ring on it as her hand and how much he wanted to just take the ring away and leave her like it was no big deal, but then--

The branch moved.

“What the-” Harry gasped, jerking his hand back to his chest protectively. He watched in horror as the branch seemed to close into a fist, his ring twisting due to the heavy stone, causing it to sit upside down on the finger--branch? Harry wasn’t sure what to call it.

His mind had hardly wrapped around what he was seeing when he realized that the ground around the--whatever it was--slowly began to squirm as if something beneath the leaves were trying to get out. Harry stumbled backwards one step, then another as the figure of a person slowly sat upright from the leaves and snow.

Harry turned around and ran blindly into the forest while still sticking to the banks of the canal. He didn’t know which direction he was heading in, but he knew it would be better than staying there to find out what was coming out of the ground.

He climbed over fallen trees, tried to bat away dead bushes and brambles that still scratched and grabbed at him, and throughout it all he attempted to tell himself that he couldn’t hear footsteps behind him. He ran faster, tried to find his surroundings, but no matter how he tried, he could not tell where he was.

He ran as fast as his legs could carry him, slipping and sliding in the snow as he tried to run around trees so that the  _ thing _ chasing him would lose his trail, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t end their chase. He thought he was approaching the town due to the light of an open field ahead of him, peeking from the darkness of the wilderness, but just as quickly as the hope came to him, it slipped away just as he did when he stepped onto the canal thinking that it was solid ground.

Harry landed on his side, knocking his head against the solid ice, shifting his view into several versions of what was really there. And what was there, fuck, he had never seen anything like it before.

A ghastly face appeared above him, all gray, rotting skin, caked with mud and ice. The blue eyes sitting within their sockets appeared as though they were going to roll out if the figure leaned in too closely, and Harry noticed that clumps of hair were missing and falling off of its scalp. Its lips drooped like they were going to fall off as it leaned over him and opened its mouth to speak.

“Where are you running off to?” A voice came out of the figure as maggots fell from its mouth each time it opened. Harry felt his lungs gasp for air as he panicked, trying to scramble away, but the dizziness in his head and a bony hand on his shoulder stopped him just as his vision went black.

The land that Harry woke up in was unlike any he’d seen before. The darkness of the sky above him was not black or blue, but instead a murky green, and the full moon was a golden yellow instead of a milky white. Harry looked around and realized that he was no longer in the woods, but instead lying on some sort of bed in what appeared to be the end of a roofless alleyway that was for some reason furnished like a bedroom.

“I think he’s awake,” a voice whispered from another area of the alley.

“Has he started breathing?”

“Hey,” the first voice whispered softly, sounding closer to Harry than it had before. The voice was male, Harry decided, and Irish. He seemed to be pointedly ignoring the second voice’s question.

“Are you alright?” the kind voice asked him. “You fainted.”

“Fainted,” Harry sighed, sitting up slowly. “Fainted?” he repeated with a crazed feeling overcoming him, thinking perhaps he’d been kidnapped. “Where am I?”

“Well, um,” the person that belonged to the kind voice bit his lip, turning to look over his shoulder at the other person.

“Tell him,” the other voice seemed to hiss, scolding, perhaps prodding the other on.

“Tell me,” Harry agreed. 

“Well,” he hesitated, stepping a bit closer to Harry. He held his hands together in front of him, picking at his fingernails nervously as he mumbled, “you’re in the land of the dead.” Harry continued to stare at him, narrowing his eyebrows as he found himself believing the sheepish looking man.

“No,” Harry frowned, “You’ve got to be kidding. I’m not  _ dead _ .”

“Well...that’s not really important--”

“Not  _ important _ ?! That is very much so  _ important _ , I’m not dead! Is this some sort of sick joke?”

“No, no, it’s not a joke! I’m sorry, I know this is all a bit shocking, but you really do have to stay.”

“Why should I have to do that?!”

“We’re  _ married  _ now, and I’m not supposed to be... _ up there _ . So we have to stay here.”

“ _ Married _ ?” Harry jumped, trying quickly to get up. “I don’t know what you’re trying to do saying things like this to me, but--”

Harry stopped, voice suddenly gone as the man before him raised his left hand, showing Harry the silver ring with a large Amethyst set into it.

“Oh god,” Harry moaned, looking down at his own hands to confirm that one of his rings was still missing from his hands.

“You said your vows in the woods. Remember? It’s okay if you don’t though,” he added on quickly, “I mean, you did hit your head pretty hard…”

“Oh my  _ god _ ,” Harry repeated--louder this time, and more distressed--as he sat back down on the edge of the bed. “How is thi--” he started, but stopped as he looked up into the cool blue eyes of the stranger, his  _ husband _ . Harry recognized him, or at least, he thought he did. He knew those eyes, he’d seen them before, but…

“At least you’re not trying to run away again,” he chuckled. “You seemed pretty spooked in the forest… Suppose I should have introduced myself before you ran off.”

“ _ You _ ?! You were that  _ thing _ that came out of the ground?!”

“That’s a bit harsh, don’t you think?” the second voice piped up, its matching slim figure stepping out of the shadows and towards Harry and his husband. “He’s not a  _ thing _ , he’s just dead.”

“I’ve got this, Louis,” his husband said softly, turning towards the other to gently push him back. The second man, Louis, eyed Harry up and down before nodding, slowly taking a few steps back into the shaded part of the alley.

“I’m sorry,” Harry started when Blue Eyes cast his gaze on him once more, “but I don’t even know your name.”

“Oh,” he smiled, “Sorry about that. I’m Niall.”

“Niall,” Harry nodded, leaning forward just a bit so that he could stare down at his feet against the cobblestone ground. “Harry,” he mumbled with no explanation.

“Harry,” Niall smiled still, slowly moving to sit beside him. “I…” he hesitated. “I know this isn’t ideal, but it truly isn’t a bad place down here. Everyone comes to love it.”

“I’m sure,” Harry whispered, biting his bottom lip as it started to quiver.

“Oh no, don’t--” Niall started, but his voice was cut off by the volume of Harry’s sob.

“That’s a keeper you’ve got there, Niall,” Louis deadpanned from his spot leaning against the wall.

“Fuck off, Louis,” Niall hissed in his direction before turning back to Harry. “Why are you crying, what’s wrong?” he said softly, reaching out to clasp one of Harry’s hands between both of his. His skin was smooth, calloused at the ends of his fingers, and freezing cold. He felt Harry jump at the touch and tug his hand away slightly, but Niall kept a strong grip.

“He’s  _ scared _ , you idiot,” Louis said apathetically. “Don’t you remember how scared  _ you  _ were when you died, Niall? Give him some time to process.” A lighter clicked after Louis spoke, lighting up his face momentarily. His expression was soft despite his voice, and Niall knew he was right.

“Do you need anything?” Niall asked softly, slowly releasing Harry’s hand. His new husband only responded with a sob, so Niall slowly rose to his feet and left the alley with Louis, mumbling something about Baby’s Breath and Forget-me-nots.

When their footsteps faded away, Harry used his tattered jacket sleeve to wipe the tears from his cheeks before laying back down onto the small bed. He turned his back towards the alley, choosing instead to face the wall--or, well, the lid, he should say. He noticed a hinge connecting his bed to the shape of a coffin lid and realized of fucking  _ course  _ they sleep in coffins in the Afterworld or Underworld or wherever the hell he found himself.

Harry laid in what he assumed to be his husband’s coffin for what seemed like an eternity, listening to footsteps pass the end of the alley and muffled voices float down through the windows above him. As he tried to process what was going on, he also tried to make a plan. He’d run away, maybe, find some sort of portal to the living world and never come back. Or maybe he’d just hide in the woods until he actually died. Maybe he could find someone and beg them to save him.

He wasn’t sure what he was going to do, but he was sure of one thing: he needed to get moving.

Harry quickly scrambled to his feet from where he was resting on the coffin, not pausing to button his jacket before he ran off down the alleyway. His head spun back and forth at the end trying to decide which way to go, but fearing that he saw Niall coming back from the left, he bolted to the right and tried to fight his way through a throng of people to distance himself from where he was.

Harry struggled to find his way through a maze of streets and corners and dead-end alleys like the one he’d come from, but eventually he came to what seemed to be a garden, though none of the plants were blooming (if it were because it was winter, well, that wasn’t Harry’s first idea).

Harry sat himself down on a curb against a concrete wall and took in a deep breath of fresh air. He felt better being alone without a reminder of where he was. It was almost as if he could close his eyes and pretend that he was sitting in his back garden instead of just past a cemetery in a dying field in another world.

“Meow,” he heard beside him. He opened his eyes and lifted his head to see a black cat with small spots of white along its feet and tail.

“Dusty?” he gasped, reaching a hand out unsurely towards the cat that had approached him. The cat raised its head towards his hand and let him pet it, beginning to purr as he did. Harry’s mood peaked then, his body filling with excitement at seeing his old cat again. He hadn’t fully believed that he wasn’t in London any longer, but he knew that this cat had died several years prior, and the only way he could be seeing it now would be if he were in a dead word.

“It’s good to see you again, Dusty,” Harry smiled fondly, allowing the cat to crawl onto his lap and curl up. “You’re looking splendid,” he added with a soft laugh. “Much better than the last time I saw you…”

“Harry?” he heard a voice call above his head. Harry leaned his head back, looking up towards the top of the wall. He saw Niall looking rather worried, yet his worry slowly turned to relief when he confirmed that he found Harry.

“Oh thank god,” Niall sighed, disappearing from the top of the wall. Harry heard what he assumed was Niall’s feet slapping against a solid staircase as he got closer, then he watched as Niall jogged up to him and sat down at his left.

“I was looking all over for you,” Niall exclaimed. “I didn’t know where you’d gone. You could have left a note if you wanted to go for a walk.”

“Sorry,” Harry whispered, running his fingers gently over the smooth fur between Dusty’s ears. “Just...needed to think.”

“Oh,” Niall nodded slowly, looking down at his hand as he twisted Harry’s ring around his finger. “I understand.” He lifted his head and looked at Harry, smiling softly when he looked back. Harry’s politely returned smile wobbled softly before he tilted his head back down to watch Dusty climb off his lap and trot away, assuming she had another owner now to find, or a mouse to chase or something of those sorts.

“Did you see much of the town on your way out here?” Niall asked slowly, fishing for something to fill the silence that sat between them.

“I’m not sure. I didn’t really pay attention.”

“Oh, well that’s alright. It’s a lovely little place.”

Harry nodded, looking anywhere but at Niall.

“Mm,” Niall hummed, “Is something on your mind?”

“You could say that,” Harry sighed, casting a quick glance towards Niall.

“Is there anything I can do for you? You know, like if you’re nervous about making new friends, I can introduce you to mine--you already met Louis, but he's he's a nice guy I swear!--or if you want a tour of the town I can give you that, or maybe--”

“Nothing like that,” Harry chuckled softly at the frantic nature of Niall’s voice. “I’m just… think about my parents. They’re not going to know what happened to me, you know? I was there with them one moment, then running away, and now...gone.”

“Oh,” Niall drew out, nodding slowly. “That is quite worrisome.”

“It is,” Harry sighed, leaning his elbow on his knee and his chin on his hand. “I just wish I’d be able to go see them one last time and tell them what happened.”

“Well,” Niall drawled, “I might be able to arrange something like that...perhaps as a...wedding present.” He smiled brightly at Harry when the latter quickly turned to look at his husband.

“Could you really?” he asked, eyes wide with excitement and wonder.

“I think so, but it might take some convincing. We’ll have to go see Simon, but...I think he’ll let us go.”

“Fantastic!” Harry cheered, climbing to his feet. “Where is he? We should go right away.”

“A bit eager, I see,” Niall laughed softly as he stood as well. “This way, then.”

Harry followed Niall through more winding streets than he could count, weaving in and out of people-traffic as they went. Harry was surprised that Niall could remember his way around streets like these that seemed to loop in and out of one another, though he was sure that Niall had been here much longer than he let on. A small thought crept into the back of Harry's mind that maybe one day he would know the streets as well as Niall did, but he quickly shook that thought away. His goal was to go home and never come back, not to stay in the cold arms of his new  _ husband _ in some hellish world.

“Here we are,” Niall called over his shoulder as he and Harry reached the top of a winding staircase that scaled the side of an old building.

“Here we are,” Harry echoed, nodding slowly as he took in their surroundings. The top of the stairs led off into an open room that looked over the city--an open  _ library _ , really, because the walls were lined with shelves that were all stacked and filled with books, and the overflow of books sat in stacks around the room.

“Simon?” Niall called, stepping over a spilled pile of books as he walked towards the back of the room. “Are you here, buddie?”

“Is that you, Niall?” a posh voice responded from somewhere behind a large podium. An average looking man with dark hair and a pleased smile stood from his hiding place. “Oh, how lovely to see you, Niall! What made you drop in?”

“It’s great to see you too, Simon. My husband here,” Niall paused and reached his hand out for Harry, and after a moment of hesitation, he took it and stepped forward to stand beside Niall. “wants to go ‘upstairs’ to visit his parents one last time.”

Simon sighed, shaking his head lightly. “Niall, you know,”

“The rules, yes, I know the rules, but this is  _ different _ . Harry has just arrived on some strange circumstances, and well, he just wants to explain to his parents what happened to him…”

Harry glanced back and forth between Simon and Niall as the two exchanged a look that he could not read. Niall opened his mouth to speak again--to beg, maybe--when Simon spoke over him.

“I suppose  _ one  _ trip can be arranged. After this trip, I will not allow either of you to go back to the land of the living; I shouldn’t let you go as it is, but I suppose I can, for your  _ wedding present _ .”

Harry felt a small pang of something in his chest hearing Simon say the same words that Niall had earlier. A wedding present, they both called it. It seemed like a big deal to Simon to let someone go to the normal world--the living world--and for some reason, he would let them go because they were newlyweds.

Harry tried not to think that the pang in his chest was guilt about his intentions once he got back home, and instead called it excitement to go home, thought home was still a daunting thought.

While he was thinking, Simon kept talking. Harry missed almost every word of it, but a quick glance at Niall let him know that he'd caught every word. Looking back to Simon, he realized that he was mixing something together, an odd silence creeping over the room.

“You’ll only have an hour before you need to return. If you stay past your allowed time, you’ll start to deteriorate and it’s likely that if someone sees you, they’ll act irrationally. Wherever you appear when you arrive is where you need to be to return. Understand?”

“I understand,” the pair said at the same time. Simon raised the potion above their heads and mumbled something Harry didn’t understand--a sort of blessing, Niall recognized--before pouring it around them in a circle.

“One hour,” he repeated as the room filled with white fog that seemed to come from the ground around them. When the fog began to clear, Harry felt cold again and could see the forest around him.

“We’re here,” he exclaimed, “we made it!”

“We did,” Niall smiled tentatively. As Harry began to take a step in the direction he thought would lead him home, Niall’s grip on his hand stopped him. Harry had almost forgotten they were holding hands; it had started to feel normal, like their hands were always together.

“I don’t think I need to go with you. There’s nothing for me left in that town. I’ll stay here, you go on. I’ll wait for you, and when the hour comes, we’ll go back together.”

“Okay,” Harry nodded, letting go of Niall’s hand slowly. “That’s fine with me. I will…,” Harry back up a step, “see you...here. In one hour.”

“In one hour,” Niall smiled, but it was a tight-lipped smile that didn’t reach his eyes. Harry felt that tinge of guilt again, but he was sure there was no way Niall could know what he was planning, and sure that if he asked Niall what was wrong, he might want to stay. So instead, Harry turned on his heel and stomped through the brush, using the moonlight to find the canal to take him home as he’d tried before.

As Harry’s silhouette faded into the darkness, Niall ran off in the other direction. He hadn’t planned on staying there to wait for Harry, and he felt wrong betraying his new husband so quickly, but this was something he thought he owed him, something for his  _ real  _ wedding gift since the trip wasn’t Niall’s idea, and wasn’t because of Niall’s doing.

As Harry crept through the woods, he found himself in a familiar bramble. It tugged and pulled and ripped at his suit the same way it had hours earlier--hours… he thought it had been hours, but it could have been years and he wouldn’t have known. Regardless, he fought through the brambles until he came to a similar clifftop. He knew if he tried to slide down, he would probably get hurt, but then again he needed to get--

Down. Down at the bottom of the cliff, not quite in the rocks and not quite on the tree roots, lay Harry’s body. It was on top of a pile of leaves, the ones he thought felt soft earlier. He didn’t know how this was happening, but he knew that his neck wasn’t supposed to bend that way down towards his shoulder and the dark bruise that bloomed on his neck was unnatural.

Harry stumbled backward from the edge of the cliff where the ground had come out from beneath his feet earlier, sending him tumbling to his apparent death. His face was contorted in shock, disgust, in  _ confusion  _ more than anything. He fell onto the ground and sat with his legs stretched in front of him as he stared dumbfoundedly at the empty space beyond the drop where the trees and the ground were lower than where he sat now.

Harry waited there for what seemed like ages, trying to wrap his head around the body that he kept peeking over to see. He couldn’t bring himself to pass it or to try to walk away from his perch above it. He felt tethered to it as he imaged anyone would to their body.

His plans were ruined, that’s for sure. He couldn’t run away to town and face his life with a family whose wealth came to them in mysterious ways. His mother would have to marry Gemma off after all, he thought as he stole another glance at himself, watching at least one version of his body’s lips turning blue from the frostbitten chill in the air. Hopefully Gemma wouldn’t cause the family so much trouble and whoever she got married to would be kind enough to let Harry’s parents live with them, or perhaps pay for their estate.

“We have to go,” a voice hissed in Harry’s ear as two arms wound their way around his sides, lifting him from where he rested on the ground.

“Wha-,” he started, but he was quickly shushed. He could hear hounds approaching in the distance from the opposite direction that Niall pulled Harry in, hands linked together again somehow.

“ _ Niall _ .” Harry tried to pull away, to dig his heels into the ground and stop himself from being pulled away from his grieving site.

“ _ Harry, _ it’s been an hour and we have to go before they get here!” Niall insisted, tightening his grip on Harry’s larger hand.

_ How do we get back? _ he wanted to ask, but before he could, Niall pulled him down into the only part of the canal that wasn’t frozen. Instead of feeling wet, Harry felt wind blow across his face, and then like nothing had happened, he was sitting beside Niall on his--their?--coffin.

They sat in silence for a moment while Harry dumbfoundedly stared at the wall across from them, his breathing labored and shaky.

“I suppose I owe you an explanation,” Niall’s voice broke the silence slowly, looking down at his hands as he twisted Harry’s ring around his finger.

Harry clenched his hands together, suddenly overcome with rage as the realization of his death finally sank in.

“Yeah, I think you fucking do,” he spat. “Why did you let me think that I was alive if I died before I even said my vows to you?”

“Because I knew you were scared, and you seemed to want to believe it no matter what, so I thought maybe it could wait.” Niall slowly met Harry’s eyes and flinched under his glare. “It didn’t wait long though! You know, since we went upstairs. I knew you’d end up finding out one way or another, but I just needed to--”

“To what?!” Harry challenged, standing just as quickly as his voice rose. “To force me to stay with you?”

“No!” Niall insisted, standing up as well. “Harry, there’s no good way to explain it to you, and I’m  _ sorry _ , but--”

“There’s  _ no _ fucking way to explain, this, Nia-”

“The cemetery!” Niall gasped, eyes widening.

“The cemetery? What’s that got to do with anything? Gonna rub it in my face that I’m never going to get a burial because a beast is going to eat my body where it lies?”

“No! Trust me,” Niall begged, reaching for Harry’s hand. “ _ Please _ , Harry. If this doesn’t change anything, then fine, we’ll do whatever it takes and I’ll never make you see me again, but  _ please _ let me try to explain this to you.”

“In the cemetery?” Harry frowned, looking down at Niall’s outstretched hand. When he looked back up and saw the desperation in Niall’s eyes and the slight tilt of his head downward in shame or perhaps nerves, he sighed.

“Fine,” Harry mumbled a he slid his hand into Niall’s. “But I don’t know what you could possibly do to make this better.”

Niall chose not to say anything, and instead he calmly led Harry from their alley to the same park that Harry ran away to earlier. They walked deeper into the park, past the garden and to the lonely cemetery Harry ignored before.

“Search the tombstones,” Niall ordered upon arrival, “You’ll know what we’re looking for when you see it.”

Niall took his own orders faster than Harry, quickly scanning the names on the burial markers that were scattered in the lot. Harry sighed and reluctantly joined in, scanning one half of the field while Niall covered the other. They walked in silence, taking in name after name until Harry was ready to give up. They’d almost gotten to the end of the cemetery when Harry found what he assumed Niall was looking for.

_ Here lies Harry Styles, taken too soon in tragedy. _

“Oh my god,” he let out in one breath, “oh my  _ god _ , Niall. Niall!”

The blond’s head snapped up from the grave he was investigating when he heard Harry calling his name.

“Did you find it?” he asked excitedly, jogging over to where he stood.

“This is what you meant, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Niall smiled softly, sheepishly once again like the first smile he’d given Harry. “They found you,” Niall whispered, turning to look at the stone.

“Who?” Harry asked just as softly, pulling his brows together as he watched Niall’s sad expression.

“When we went to the living world, I went into your town and said I found a body in the woods… And I think the, uh, the hounds you heard before we left…? Pretty sure they were search hounds. And since this is here, they must have found you. You won’t have to rot out in the forest like…”

“Like…?” Harry drawled, watching Niall wipe a tear from his eye, and  _ oh _ .

Harry’s shoulders relaxed as he watched Niall draw a smile onto his face, small and sad, but genuine.

“It wasn’t a big deal,” he shrugged his shoulders softly, reaching down to trace the smooth top of the stone. “You had said you wanted your parents to know where you were, and whether you meant it or not, I wanted to help you.”

“That’s… that’s more than what I expected, Niall. That’s…”

“I don’t know if it makes up for not telling you that you’d died, but I thought this would be better for you to see than to hear it from me…” He sighed and took a sharp breath before looking up at Harry. He seemed to quite literally swallow his pride before speaking again.

“I know you didn’t necessarily want to marry me--you couldn’t even tell it was me beneath the leaves, could you?--but I wanted to do this for you so you had the opportunity to leave this land of the dead and to move on, to be at eternal rest. Not everyone gets that opportunity, but I wanted that for you, I want the best for you.”

“Niall,” he whispered in awe, “I can’t… I could never thank you enough for doing that.”

“It’s what you deserve. I could tell you were a kind soul--hell, this whole time you’ve been too nice to tell me to fuck off,” he chuckled, looking back down at the stone by their feet.

“I couldn’t have done that. I  _ can’t  _ do that.”

“I told you that you have the option to, though, really. You can leave me if you want. Carry on to rest, stay here without me, or…”

“Stay here with you,” Harry finished, slowly reaching out to Niall’s hand. He looked up slowly until his eyes met Harry’s, but he could hardly hold his gaze.

“Pardon me, but the words are enough right?”

“Wha--”

“I want to do it right this time. _We_ should do it right." He paused to gauge Niall's reaction before continuing. "With this hand, I will lift your sorrows.”

“Harry, you don’t--”

“Your cup will never empty, for I will be your wine.”

Niall’s hands squeezed Harry’s tightly, breath drawing up and getting caught in his throat.

“With this candle,” Harry began, trailing off for Niall to finish.

“I will light your way in darkness. With this ring,”

“I ask you to be mine,” they finished together.

Harry cupped his free hand against Niall’s cheek before slowly leaning in, pressing their lips together gently. It was different than any kiss Harry had experienced before, as many as he had. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but it made him feel like things would be okay, like things were meant to be this way.


End file.
